'EVERYONE had told my manager not to hire this guy': 20+ Office employees who got fired for doing their jobs badly

Author image for Remy Millisky
Remy Millisky • Writer and Editor
Apr 8, 2025 5:00 PM EDT

Every workplace has that one firing story that's so outrageous that it's told in a hushed voice, like you're sharing scary tales around the campfire. Oftentimes, the fired employee has been a thorn in the boss's side for quite a while. When they get fired, they flip their lid, letting out all of that pent-up frustration. 

A lot of workplaces do their firings in the early morning before the other employees come in to avoid situations like that. But sometimes, firing an employee during the workday can't be helped. One workplace practice that stands out in these stories is the place that revokes their worker's entry badges when they're laid off. So they arrive in the morning and try to enter the building, only to realize that they can't! Is it a badge problem, or have they been fired in the clunkiest way possible? Well, they have to wait for their boss to come tell them before finding out. 

You can check out a bunch of interesting firing stories down below. Then, read about the 17-year-old country club worker who got back at their bad boss, sharing that, "I quit on the busiest day of the year." 

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    Cheezburger Image 10491309824
    via Getty Images For Unsplash+

    The image does not depict the actual subjects of the story. Subjects are models.

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    "Office Job employees of Reddit, what's the nastiest/ugliest firing process you've ever witnessed from the comfort of your cubicle?"

    000-000-000yea We had someone disappear from the office, indicating they are no more. A few hours later our boss called us into a meeting and said something like "I know some of you know Mike isn't
    via u/ooo-ooo-oooyea
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    with the company any more, I will assure you we are financially fine, Mike just really sucked at his job so I fired him". Cold, but honest!
    via u/ooo-ooo-oooyea
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    P... My old manager hired a guy with a PHD. The entire department told my manager not to do it, but he did, because the guy had a PHD. Unfortunately, his PHD was in civil engineering, and he was being hired as a web developer. My manager seemed to assume that because he had a PHD, he
    via u/PM_ME_UR_PUPPYDOGS
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    could just pick up programming in a few hours and it wouldn't be an issue. Besides, none of the other applicants had a PHD. PHD guy spent 6 weeks trying to create a few buttons for our home page. He started to "work from home" during his third week to have "fewer distractions" and had absolutely no completed work to show for it for the next three weeks.
    via u/PM_ME_UR_PUPPYDOGS
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    When PHD guy was finally forced to come back in to work to present his (lack of) progress, my manager had to fire him. Manager-man wasn't nasty or ugly about it, but the whole thing was super cringey and uncomfortable because EVERYONE had told my manager not to hire this guy and knew exactly what had gone down, but my manager tried to blame his Director
    via u/PM_ME_UR_PUPPYDOGS
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    for cutting our department's funding, saying they could no longer afford an additional programmer. Our funding hadn't actually been cut (confirmed this with our CFO), but my manager didn't hire a new web developer because he wanted to keep up his story. We really needed the developer.
    via u/PM_ME_UR_PUPPYDOGS
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    SorrySeptember First day on the job I met this very nice, cool-girl type vet tech I was going to be working with before being whisked away on a tour of the rest of the facilities. By the time I got back (like five minutes tops, it was not a big place) the cool girl vet tech had been fired. Her reaction to the news was to throw one of the chairs in the treatment area at some
    via u/SorrySeptember
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    $$$$ equipment then stormed out yelling about what a our manager was. I should've seen this as a red flag but instead assumed the chick was just a few fries short of a Happy Meal and went about my life. Found out much later that the tech actually had asked for a leave of absence to take care of her terminally ill brother in a different state.
    via u/SorrySeptember
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    The request was approved. by the manager a few days before only for it to be denied after the tech brought up that she'd be unavailable to train me because she'd be taking the leave soon. Felt terribly for that girl once I realized what happened, I would have chucked more than a chair at the guy if the same happened to me. I was at that place for a few
    via u/SorrySeptember
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    years but eventually couldn't stomach the management and tapped out.
    via u/SorrySeptember
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    [deleted] I used to work for a towing company. After they fired one guy, he stole "his" tow truck and dumped it in a lake, with the owner's personal truck on the bed.
    via u/[deleted]
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    This was a wild first day for this employee

    [deleted] The first day I started working for this construction company, the general manager decided to immediately fire someone from from the health & safety department. That person obviously must have f ed up pretty bad, and department must have been poorly managed, because they went around the H&S manager and fired the
    via u/[deleted]
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    employee directly. My cubicle was right across from the H&S managers office. That employee marched into the H&S manager's office and said "Hey, that f <general manager> fired me", then stormed out of the building. It was weird because I was introduced to her at around 9am, and she was fired at 11.
    via u/[deleted]
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    Well the H&S manager was pretty ped that his employee was fired, and that they circumvented him in the process. So like any reasonable manager, he starts screaming and trashing his office. I don't get up and look, as I don't want to be in his firing line,
    via u/[deleted]
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    but I can hear it pretty clearly. Finally, I hear a large book shelf get knocked over and get a quick glimpse of him storming out of the building. I never saw the guy again.
    via u/[deleted]
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    ar... The supervisor strutted around as if she had just eaten a bld meal and tore up the baby pictures the employee had pinned up. Too bad they belonged to another employee.
    via u/argtri
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    core-void Couple that stick with me. Worked for a firm that did IT consulting for a smallish (100 people) company. We hired a guy that had expertise that we needed for a Latin America gig. He ended up relocating halfway across the US (at his own expense) to work for us and while his family was getting settled he was shipped off
    via u/core-void
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    around Latin America countries to do IT things. He caught Malaria a couple weeks in, flew back home, and while still recovering was told that his services were no longer needed. Recently the company I work for laid off a significant portion of the workforce. This company does not have a history of letting people go or even firing people. HQ sent the list of layoffs to our
    via u/core-void
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    local office and as HR processed them there was no security out of the building or anything like that. One of the great guys that's worked with us for years, stellar performance and everything, got told his job was going away and his services were no longer needed and on the way back to his desk he was asked to tell one of his peers to head down to the HR office. He
    via u/core-void
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    did and then sat at his desk sobbing. Of course everyone in the building basically stopped what they were doing and crowded around as the 2nd guy came back with instructions for one of his other peers to head to HR. The day was spent with these laid off folks being allowed to stay in the office and none of us having a good idea what was going on. Layoffs are
    via u/core-void
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    enough but this was such a bad way to go about it. Fortunately there were no incidents and we were able to get contact info to stay in touch. But man... there were thoughts of leaving the office for our own safety as well as avoiding being told to come by the HR office. So messed up.
    via u/core-void
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    martymayi Worked for a large company when 200 employees were brought to head office in Texas for a central "meeting" at a large hotel. Everyone goes into the main conference center and with in minutes are told that the company is restructuring and that there are envelopes at the door for everyone in the meeting. In the envelope was either your walking
    via u/martymayi
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    papers or you you were given a hotel room number and time where you were told what your new job was. You were then given 24 hours to accept or reject. Many of the reorganized were asked to moved to new states and take jobs at or below their current status. A complete sh show of emotions as over half of the people invited were told this was their last day. Here's
    via u/martymayi
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    you hat what's your hurry kind of deal. Imagine flying home to your significant other as a "de d man walking" FYI I was not in the meeting but my boss was and was one of the ones who kept his job but in another state. The look on his face when he returned was incredulous knowing he had to move him and his family after he had only just moved 6 months
    via u/martymayi
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    before to take this role lucky for him he still had most of his moving boxes.
    via u/martymayi
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    000
    via Getty Images For Unsplash+

    The image does not depict the actual subjects of the story. Subjects are models.

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    Angry McMurder VP at one place I worked got fired by the CEO over the phone. CEO went into a room right near my cube, closed the door, and proceed to have a straight up screaming match with this guy on the other line.
    via u/Angry McMurder
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    Turns out the VP was in charge of IT and ordering, and didn't require any oversight on purchases under $10/k, so he ordered network switches that cost about $9k each and sold em privately. Ended up getting away with something like six and a half million dollars, and the CEO just found out just before.
    via u/Angry McMurder
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    bstyledevi Not an office job, but I want to throw in one of mine from my work. Guy was a warehouse employee, kinda lazy, slow, but stuff would eventually get done. We had a bunch of pallets show up that needed inventoried and put away. He was walking around the warehouse with his hands in his pockets. My boss went
    via u/bstyledevi
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    out to talk to him and told him that if you dont wanna work, you can just go home (implying that he can take the day off unpaid leave and come back tomorrow). Employee flips out and starts screaming at the boss, loud enough that the sales crew had to put calls on hold because of the commotion. He was screaming that the manager was "the worst boss
    via u/bstyledevi
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    I've ever had." He then walks back out to the warehouse and kicks a trash can across the receiving area. He grabs his stuff, yells at the manager "this isnt over, not by a long shot!" and leaves out the door.
    via u/bstyledevi
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    finlyboo I had started a new job and another woman there had started a few days before me. By my first day the owner realized that she was fairly incompetent for the job and that I was more than minimally qualified and more enthusiastic, so he decided to let her go and just focus on training me. The next day she comes in but the boss is late. During the morning we
    via u/finlyboo
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    found out it was her birthday via 3 different flower deliveries, ending with her husband bringing her a homemade cake. She didn't make it through the lunch hour, making eye contact while she walked by me carrying a box with 3 flower vases and half a cake was pretty awkward.
    via u/finlyboo
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    ConstableBlimey... Less nasty and more cringey/awkward: the boss of the department called us all (including my supervisor) into a meeting room and explained that said supervisor will be leaving the company at the end of the month. Some dumba doesn't get that the supervisor was being fired
    via u/ConstableBlimeyChips
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    and asks he's what company he's moving to. Cue awkward answer explaining the situation. That was me, I was the dumba.
    via u/ConstableBlimeyChips
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    This must be terrible for morale!

    AlreadyShrugging My company takes great pains to avoid visible firings. We work in an open floor cubicle farm. Usually people are "disappeared" without any public notice. Shortly after, we get called into a meeting and instructed to
    via u/AlreadyShrugging
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    not spread rumours/reminded that they will not discuss what happened. Then, there are 2-3 weeks of rumours flying around the office. Happens every time.
    via u/AlreadyShrugging
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    MNCPA First job out of college. Private equity firm. First day, I was supposed to fire the person that was training me.
    via u/MNCPA
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    She was stealing from the company and figured out that I was to replace her. She never showed up but gave herself a 'going away' bonus (the position oversaw payroll). I hated that job. Never said anything.
    via u/MNCPA
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    alonelysmile CEO decided to let people go in preparation for a recession in the US (this was a couple months ago). One guy started crying and said he needed the job for his health insurance and his bills that he needed to pay. He kept yelling things like he's useful to the company and he'll prove his worth, and then other times he was screaming how unfair it was
    via u/alonelysmile
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    for him to get let go out of all people. He was locked in a glass walled conference room with a bunch of co- workers trying to calm him down and comfort him. Because of his reaction, our IT department quickly removed all electronic access that he had including phone, email, access to computer, access to remove laptop, etc... He threw a tantrum all over the office,
    via u/alonelysmile
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    went into everyone's office to cry and ask to put in a good word, and it was just a mess. Later on that day, while refusing to leave the office, he pointed at me and yelled at his manager" what about him?!" aka I should be let go instead of him. Luckily I'm the youngest, lowest paid worker at the company. Never thought of job security like that before.
    via u/alonelysmile
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    technofiend One of my clients had a policy of cancelling employee badges without telling the employees they'd been laid off. The brutal part was they had these narrow turnstiles three in a row and everyone jammed into long lines badging in every morning. So if you had to ask the security guard why your badge wasn't working it was in front of 50 of your
    via u/technofiend
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    peers and everyone in the building knew by lunch you'd been let go. It was humiliating even when as happened to me it was because my boss hadn't done everything properly to keep my badge active as a contractor.
    via u/technofiend

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